


resist

by broblerone



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Canon Timeline, Concussions, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Self-Hatred, contains spoilers for chapter 4, takes place after chapter 3's trial
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-26
Updated: 2018-05-26
Packaged: 2019-05-13 23:52:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14758662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/broblerone/pseuds/broblerone
Summary: ouma cracks under the pressure of his plan and breaks down in the bathroom.(written for the oumota discord server! it's not really shippy though skhfskfdhf sorry)





	resist

Your knuckles are white from your grip on the sides of the sink. You managed to escape the cafeteria without anyone noticing your grimace, but you can see it plain as day in the mirror. The broken skin under your hairline is still red. The stiff pain in your head makes you feel dizzy every time you stand up. You feel dizzy now, looking at your unfamiliar reflection.

Is this what a concussion feels like?

You can’t bear to look at your own discomfort anymore. You’ll soldier through the headache and pretend like nothing is wrong later, but for now you decide to lean against the wall beside the sink and crumple to the floor. You pull your knees up to your chest with the intention of resting your head on them, but all that accomplishes is aggravating the cuts on your forehead. You sigh, resigned, and let your head fall back against the wall behind you. The fluorescent lights on the ceiling don’t have little flies hovering around them. Your head pounds. You wince.

Allowing someone to help you would mean allowing someone to see that you’re in pain (purely physical, you tell yourself), and you can’t let people know that you’re fallible. Not if you want your plan to work. If you can be on the mastermind’s playing field, then you can beat them at their own game. Everyone will be free. Everyone that’s still alive will  _ remain  _ alive. All you have to do is lie until nobody can trust  _ anything  _ you say,  _ force  _ them to acknowledge you as the threat you’ll have to be. All you have to do is get everyone to hate you.

You’re well on your way. You wince again. Desperation claws at your throat, begging you for the same thing it always does, and you force it down the same way you always do. That’s the difference between you and everyone else here-- not what you want, but how well you can resist it. It’s clear to you now that you’re the only one strong enough to shove aside your craving for it, to ignore the way your heart seizes when it slips further from reach, to sabotage your chances of ever finding it.

The only way you can resist that need for approval is to convince yourself that you don’t want it. 

As it turns out, lying to yourself is a lot harder than lying to others.

Your head gives another anxious throb. The defenses around your heart are being redirected to your brain against your will, leaving you more bare than you’re comfortable confronting yourself with. You close your eyes tight to escape the parts of yourself you can see in front of you, but you’re greeted with your own pained face. When you try to force yourself to smile, something tightens in your chest.

It’s worth it. It’s worth it. It’s worth it. It has to be worth it, or there won’t be anyone else who can pull it off. You swallow hard. Your throat strains with your chest. 

You’re going to die soon, if you can’t let go of your senseless inhibitions. You’ve seen Iruma’s plans, sneaking into the lab on the pretense of giving her shit. She always lets you. She loses herself when you insult her to her face. You wonder if her plot makes your harassment feel better. You’re going to die. You’re going to die with everyone hating you. Even in death, you’ll be alone.

Alone. The word catches in your breath even though you aren’t speaking it. It makes your chest constrict tighter around your lungs, it makes your nails dig into your legs from where your arms are fastened around them, it makes your vision swim in a way that your concussion can’t explain. You’re alive, and you’re alone, and you’re  _ going to die alone.  _

Everyone hates you. You’re going to continue making them hate you. You’re going to lie your last breath away on the insistence of your unique strength while your knees buckle and your resolve crumbles just in time for it to not matter anymore. It’s a sacrifice that has to be made. You tell yourself that it’s worth it. You’re lying. You’ve never felt so selfish before.

You’re going to die alone.

Your body lurches forward as you clamp your hands down over your mouth, but the way the world spins makes it impossible to choke down the strangled sob in your chest. Your vision blurs as another one follows it, but when you blink to clear your eyes you feel wet drops roll down your cheeks. You gasp for air, but your lungs spit it right back out  as if it’s poison, as if the only way to resist its burn is to scream it all out of your system. Your efforts to stifle yourself are only successful in keeping the sound of your weakness confined to the bathroom.

But within the walls of the bathroom, it sounds like someone is drowning. 

You’re dying. You’re sure that you’re dying, right now, and you’re alone. You’re alone. You’re alone.

The door opens. You’re silent. If you die now, then you can revel in the safety of being alone. Your plan would die with you, but it would be immortalized as feasible.

When Kaito Momota sees you, head hung, hands clasped over your mouth, panicked eyes still welling with tears, your plan approaches impossibility. Your mind screams at you to act, to find a way to weasel yourself out of this situation, to will away your tears the way you can will away the fake ones, but your body remains frozen. You swear your heart stops beating. You’ve never been caught with your defenses down.

You’ve never even  _ had  _ your defenses down before.

Momota’s expression flashes from surprise, to anger, to concern, then back to anger as he steps toward you. It’s only when he’s standing right above you, looking down at the way you tremble, processing for the first time how  _ small  _ you are despite your loud personality, that he truly seems taken aback. He wrings his hands for a long moment. You expect yourself to smile and giggle, pop up and call him an idiot before scampering back to your room. You’re sure he’s expecting the same. When the two of you are suitably at a loss for expectations, he kneels down beside you. 

“...Ouma? Dude, uh… are, are you okay?”

Even when he’s sitting, he’s still so much  _ bigger  _ than you. You can feel the uncertain tension radiating off of him. Is he scared that you’ll attack him? Have you played your role so well that the act of expressing a genuine emotion is enough to make people nervous? Or is he just the type of person to flounder around tears?

You don’t notice the quiet sobs bubbling up from your chest until you feel his hand on your shoulder. He looks at you like you’ve just grown a second head, but also like you’re an injured kitten kicked to the side of the road. Your cheeks burn red in the flames being used to incinerate all your hard work. You can’t bring yourself to look at him anymore. 

There’s a long moment filled only with the hum of the flyless fluorescent bulbs above you and the sporadic hiccuping of your humiliated cries. The wordless tension is broken by Momota when he asks you what’s wrong. You laugh at the question without humor, but he wraps his arm around you when you tell him you’re alone.

You hadn’t known that the inside of his jacket was made of satin.


End file.
